100 million Nigerians live in destitution – World Bank

About 100 million Nigerians live in destitution, the World Bank has said.

The World Bank Country Director for Nigeria,

Francoise Marie-Nelly, said this at the bank’s Country Programme Portfolio Review in Enugu on Tuesday.

She said that the bank’s ongoing commitment to Nigeria stood at $5.34bn. According to the World Bank boss, the number of Nigerians living in destitution makes up 8.33 per cent of the total number of people living in destitution

which the bank plans to

over the world,

all

drastically by 2030.

She said, “1.2 billion people live in destitution out of which 100 million are Nigerians. Inequality is rising in many developing nations.

“For this reason, the World Bank’s corporate perspective has shifted more strategically in the past year. The World

international

galvanise

to

wants

Bank

support around two goals: to end extreme poverty in a generation and to push for greater equality.

“To end extreme poverty, the World Bank Group’s goal is to decrease the percentage of people living on less than $1.25 a day from 20 per cent today to three per cent by 2030.

“The goal is to promote income growth of the bottom 40 per cent of the population in each country. In Nigeria, 63 per cent of the population live on less than $1.25 a day.”

Marie-Nelly said although the World Bank was the largest overseas development agency that provided assistance to Nigeria, the contribution of the organisation to the country was very small compared to the budgets of the states and the Federal Government.

if the World Bank’s small assistance could

She said

produce so much result

implementation and monitoring, the revenues accruable to the country could do much more if they were similarly utilised.

Giving a more graphic picture of the World Bank’s credit to Nigeria in relation to revenues accruing to the nation, Marie-Nelly said while the bank’s total commitment to Nigeria amounted to $4.67bn by 2012, the budget of the states and Federal Government amounted to $64.05bn in the same year.

She said the World Bank’s portfolio amounted to $5.34bn as of June 2013, while the

Government alone for 2013 amounted to $31.17bn.

She said the bank had shifted

Government centric to a more balanced federal and state level support.

She said the annual Country Programme Portfolio Review, which the bank undertakes with various governments, was necessary to assess the progress